Georgia planning to introduce Covid-19 ‘passports’

The Georgian authorities plan to introduce Covid vaccine documents for all citizens of the country, Minister of Economy of Georgia Natia Turnava announced earlier today.

These new passports will contain complete information about an individual’s Covid-19 status and will be available in both electronic and print formats; the Covid passports will also be used to travel or in case of a medical emergency.

“Introducing Covid passports is a very interesting initiative of the Ministry of Health which was also supported by the prime minister. The Ministry of Health and the Center for Disease Control in cooperation with other state institutions are now working on the development of the documents. The concept of a Covid passport will be presented in the near future”, Turnava said.

The minister also noted that in two weeks, the pandemic-induced restrictions may be eased, although she did not specify whether the existing curfew will be lifted.

“The Coordination Council will soon re-assess the number of confirmed cases over the last two weeks, and if the number is [relatively] low, the existing rules will be eased”, Turnava said.

• Majority of Georgian population doesn’t want Covid-19 vaccine – NDI survey
• Georgian church stands by decision not to assist vaccination campaign
• How is Covid-19 vaccination progressing in Armenia?
  

The curfew has been in effect in Georgia for six months now, starting from November 9, 2020. As an exception, it was lifted twice – on the New Year’s eve and during the Orthodox Christmas celebrations.

The vaccination process in the country is still relatively slow. Mistrust in vaccines, as well as the overall management of the vaccination process, have become serious obstacles to the nationwide vaccination program in Georgia. People are forced to travel several hundred kilometers because there are no vacant places in the vaccination queue in their hometowns. At the same time, there are still several thousand unused doses of vaccines in the country.

At the moment, four types of vaccines are being used in the country – the German-American Pfizer, the British AstraZeneca, as well as the Chinese Sinopharm, and Sinovak.

Only two of them, Pfizer and AstraZeneca – have already received authorization from the World Health Organization, while the Chinese Sinopharm received WHO approval on May 6.